What are the connections between cattle branding and Christian salvation, between livestock castration and square dancing, between cattle rustling and the making of spurs and horsehair bridles in prison, between children's coloring books and cowboy poetry as it is practiced today? The Cowboy uses literary, historical, folkloric, and pop and cultural sources to document ways in which cowboys address religion, gender, economics, and literature. Arguing that cowboys are defined by the work they do, Allmendinger sets out in each chapter to investigate one form of labor (such as branding, castration, or rustling) in the cowboy's "work culture." He looks at early oral poems recited around campfires, on trail drives, at roundups, and at home in ranch bunkhouses, and at later poems, histories, and autobiographies written by cowboys about their work - most of which have never before received scholarly attention. Allmendinger shows how these texts address larger concerns than the work at hand - including art, morality, spirituality, and male sexuality. In addition to spotlighting little-known texts, art, and archival sources, The Cowboy examines the works of Mark Twain, John Steinbeck, Willa Cather, Louis L'Amour, Larry McMurtry, and others. Unique among studies of the American cowboy, Allmendinger's study looks at what cowboys thought of themselves, and the ways in which they represented those thoughts in their own prose, poetry, and artifacts. Richly illustrated with photographs of cowboys at work and at play, many previously unpublished, The Cowboy will interest scholars of American literature and history, and American Studies, as well as those interested in Western history and culture,folklore, and gender studies.
""The Log of a Cowboy" is the finest piece of literature that the cattle-country has produced." - Douglas Branch in "The Cowboy and His Interpreters". "If all other books on trail-driving were destroyed, a reader could get an authentic conception of trail men, trail work, range cattle, cow horses, and the cow country in general from "The Log of a Cowboy"." - J. Frank Dobie. "As a narrative of cowboy life, Andy Adams' book is clearly the real thing. It carries its own certificate of authentic first-hand experience on every page." - Chicago Herald. "Since the movie producers have little regard for actuality, we must look to literature to preserve the truth of the cattle trail era for us... Andy Adams did it excellently well when he wrote "The Log of a Cowboy". Adams spent twelve years in the saddle in Texas. He began writing when broke after seeing a ludicrous and false depiction of cattle-range life... "The Log of a Cowboy" is the work of a realist." - "The New Republic".
